Yesterday, I had a back & forth on Twitter with Sam SM (a developer) and Jeff Pierce (a recruiter) about the recruitment industry, and I wasn't shy about my thoughts that most recruiters are going to burn in hell along with lawyers and most people in marketing and advertising. While we can roast those industries later, here are my thoughts on why recruiters are an annoying, intrusive, disruptive, and ultimately necessary bunch.

I get emails from recruiters more and more frequently these days, and I can only imagine its a nightmare for my peers with real talent. Generally, they are quite pleasant and fall along the lines of some feigned interest in my life and some excuse for stumbling across my profile on LinkedIn or something, and then a request to talk further. Other times, they're more direct & proposition a job opening directly, sometimes even listing salary and benefits in the first email.

I don't mind those too much, although, when I don't reply, I now feel like I've been made into the asshole, and when I do reply, my "no" is often mistaken for a "not yet", and they promise to keep in touch. It's like a bad joke about workplace harassment.

A breed of recruiter exists, however, who's sole job is to put asses in seats. These guys prowl User Groups and Meetup.com forums, blasting D-lists and sending dozens, sometimes hundreds of unsolicited emails a day. My friends at eHire, Hunter, and SolTech would probably say that these guys aren't representative of the industry at large, but I think perhaps they are, and my friends just try to stand out from the crowd. To be fair, most recruiters I know in Atlanta are pretty decent, but I think there is still an onus upon them to better define the rules of ettiquette their profession is bound by, and demonstrate how they live up to them.

One of the refreshing things about working in technology is that, with rare exception, you are either good at what you do, or you aren't. Even though we love arguing about Ruby vs. PHP vs. Whatever; at the end of the day, we all know that almost anything can be done in one of a seemingly infinite number of ways. That is one of the luxuries of our trade. If your stuff works, it works. If it doesn't, it's your fault. I, for example, am not a good developer, and anyone who reads my code knows that. This is my motivation to keep learning... and why I love my developer friends, because they're the one crowd that I can't sneak anything past by being charming or smooth talk (I'm looking at you, Social Media experts). In recruiting, there's not really a gold standard that I've found yet.

Recruiters are also a challenge facing Startups. A young company might attend an event, possibly looking to attract talent, but now they have to compete against recruiters, who, ironically, are going to try to sell the talent they find... back to the startup. It's like being in a drug war with your own dealer. This of course, is a temporary problem, mostly caused by the ridiculous amounts of money injected into the Startup world right now, and once the bubble bursts, recruiters will go back to chasing the IBMs of yesteryear (whoever they may be tomorrow), and startups will be forced back into hiring through relationships.

So, recruiters... we need you. We actually want you, because you do a good thing, but get your act together. It's not up to us to call out your peers when they overstep the bounds of privacy and courtesy. Apply pressure on your coworkers and competitors to not just be headhunters and sharks. Educate your junior recruiters (especially the pretty girls you drag around to all the conferences). Please, have some in-house training on what life is really like in IT, software development, product management, and sales. Understand what makes us tick, so when you come looking for us, you're not just another shotgun in our inbox. And, above all, obey Wheaton's Law.

And, hey, if you are a recruiter, take a moment to help out some of my friends: Justin Gorski, Cassie Syfrett

If you'd like to buy me a beer, or think I'm talking out of my ass and want to stab me, I'm on Twitter.

Yes, that's right. I've started writing a book. Who knows, maybe I'll get it done this year. Maybe, this decade... maybe never. I don't really care. I want something to write and the idea isn't going to go away. I've been wanting to put down this story on paper for a while now, so I finally took my first stab. I've got my basic premise, my plot, my character(s)... I haven't really finished my scene in my mind... but I'm working on it. I also haven't really nailed down my conflict or resolution, but you know, those are just details.

I've begun writing on my iPad, using iCloud to sync to my phone. Since I'm not running Lion yet, I'm missing out on this on my computer, which is a shame, and makes me think it's time for me to get a bluetooth keyboard for the iPad (although I'm quite speedy on it).

Anyway, with no working title or solid game plan, we can now add "author" to my list of projects that I take on. Hopefully this will be one of the ones I finish.

Yes, I know it's Jan. 31st. I don't care.

1. Learn a programming language and build a few projects that use it. I'm starting with JavaScript and using CodeAcademy to learn. I really like it so far.

2. Travel more. At the end of 2011, I was fortunate enough to be able to visit California for my first time, and New York City for the second time. I really want to keep this trend going and try to take a couple flights this year.

3. Turn more of my online friendships IRL. I've met some amazing people online and formed friendships that have lasted years. Every time I get the chance to meet one of these people in real life, I am reminded that the world is full of beautiful, amazing people and that the internet allows us to choose relationships based on our interests rather than just finding people near us.

The #occupy movement in the United States is only a mirror of a larger struggle for intellectual, financial, and civil freedom taking place around the world. The incidences of police brutality that have taken place here in the United States should shock us as they do, but they are nothing compared to what our friends in other countries are facing. It appears that giving someone a uniform and a baton does not instantly impart a sense of universal law and justice upon them.

Rendering Synthetic Objects into Legacy Photographs from Kevin Karsch on Vimeo.

It's here. It's finally here. An official announcement from Apple that an iPhone-related press conference will be held on Apple's main campus in Cupertino, October 4th, 2001. I realize I'm not the first one to notice this, but my take on the poster is that, as usual, Apple has hidden some clues inside. First, the tagline, "Let's talk iPhone", is almost certainly an indicator that we will see Assistant in iOS 5. This is the technology that will allow us to use our phone as a true personal assistant and perform even highly complex actions with voice commands. As someone who drives a lot for my work, I can't wait to be able to send text messages and get directions by voice rather than having to constantly risk my life by looking down and typing.

Also of note, is the singular badge on the phone icon. There has been lots of speculation that Apple would be releasing two phones, the iPhone 5, and a lower-cose iPhone "4S" to enter the lower-end market and possibly serve as a prepaid option. It looks like that's not the case, and we'll only be seeing one phone, at least, if we're reading Apple's thinly veiled hints correctly.

The iPhone 4 will probably continue to be sold and meet this market, and we will only see one new phone from Apple. I may not be a radical departure from the iPhone 4 in physical format, but with the new software, plus a rumoured 1GB of RAM and the dual-core A5 processor from the iPad 2, this phone is sure to be amazing. I just can't wait until the 4th to find out!

Ok, really this is just for @mike_ftw to read.

No, I'm not saying he time travelled. No, I'm not saying he's intentionally pretending to be a brand (he's clearly not). The guy just got lucky.

I'm saying Quikster *can't* buy the handle, even if they wanted to, it's a violation of Twitter's policies.

However, if you have the twitter handle of a brand, and attempt in any way to imitate them that is also a violation of policy, and if you attempt to sell said account, same thing. I'm guessing this guy doesn't know that, and once he realizes his newfound fame, he'll try both.

At that point, some Twitter admin will swoop in, and declare him in violation of policy and suspend his account. Then, they'll just transfer it over to the "real" Quikster, and homeboy will have to get a new Twitter account.

And I really don't think it's illegal to post pictures of Harry Potter. I think we can fair use that stuff.